Written on April 18, 2014

Written on April 18, 2014

I didn’t REALLY have time to contemplate becoming a mother. I mean, obviously we knew we were going to be parents when we signed up with the adoption agency. We just didn’t know WHEN. Essentially, from the time we decided to adopt, which was Nov. 1, 2013, to today, which is April 18, 2014, it’s been a little more than five months. And it’s been even LESS time since we were approved (paperwork, background checks and home study), and even LESS time since our profile book was completed and even LESS time since our profile book was shown.

But I’ve really had since last Sunday night to accept and digest that I’m going to be a mother and I’m going to be a mother soon.

We started our baby registry. I say “we” but I really mean I am adding stuff like crazy. All unisex for now, just in case it’s a boy. Which is hard because baby girls’ stuff is SO SO SO SO SO SO CUTE. The strawberries and cherries and pink pandas and polka dots. So anyway, I’ve been researching registry checklist items and adding them as I see fit and necessary. And I’m Googling terms and items I’ve never heard of before. I feel like I’m learning really fast. Until two nights ago, when I just started reading “Bringing home baby from the hospital,” I didn’t know that not all babies follow strict feeding schedules or that formula can be mixable powder or ready-to-drink liquid. Luckily I was able to skip through the breastfeeding chapter, because, ya know.

Still mixed. One minute I want to literally scream at the top of my lungs how excited I am. I looked up all the State College mom-baby playgroups and activities and music lessons and stroller groups. (Thank you, Mothers and More). And I want to send our birth announcements. And I want to tell everyone her name. And I want to just be a Mom.

But I have to, HAVE to slow down. And remind myself this isn’t final. This isn’t certain. Birth mom can change her mind. She just can. And baby might not be ours.

It’s so hard to know but not know.

To know she’s coming but now know if she’s ours.

To know she’s coming but not know when she’s coming.

To know she’s a girl but not really know she’s a girl.

To have convinced myself in less than a week that I can, indeed do this, and have convinced myself in less than a week that I might, just might, really have to do this.

And right now everything else in the world matters. Immensely. But when she comes she will be all that matters. I already know that.

And the baby thermometer and duck bath mitten. How do other adoptive parents do it? Especially ones who are given less time than we have been given. We met another adoptive family that had only a few hours notice; they were told to go to Harrisburg to pick up their baby that day, the day it was born. They didn’t even have a diaper.

It’s amazing to me how I can be so scared and yet so calm all at the same time. It’s a new calm.

The panic for the year before my wedding and the calm walking down the aisle.

The panic for weeks before my 10-minute Moth monologue in Washington, D.C., and then the calm when I opened my mouth.

The panic for seven months before Tour de Pink and the calm as I rode my bike 213 miles and across the finish line.

I would never even consider using the word “calm” at a time like this, but now, for some strange reason, all of a sudden, I think that’s how I feel. Something has come over me. My crazy-planning-schedules-don’t-like-when-my-world-is-turned-upside-down self will just DEAL. There’s a baby on the way and I need to calm the hell down.

So I did. I am.

My mind is crazy with thoughts of her. Thoughts of sharing the news with our family and friends. Thoughts of the celebrations and the sleepness nights. I want to do SO much, yet I can’t. Right now there’s nothing to do. Nobody to tell. Nothing to plan. Not until she gets here.

And planning and scheduling is HOW I COPE. It’s how I cope with change, whether sudden or planned. I schedule to regain control. I make lists, I run errands, I make plans, I make phone calls. That’s how I deal. That’s my coping mechanism. And now I’m being tested because I can’t do any of that. I can just add unisex items to the baby registry and wonder and hope and pray one day soon I can do more.